3. Students work in groups to make flashcards for the words and expressions from Steps 1 and 2. They illustrate the expression in the top half of the card and write it in Hiragana beneath the illustration. These cards could be put up around the room.

4. Students complete Worksheet 17.

LESSON 7

Characters in the ろくにん の ともだち stories.

Students re-read the four stories and complete Reading Comprehension Questions 4 and 5.

LESSON 8

Creative Activity: Planning a climb of Mt Fuji

Students work in pairs

You will need:

Internet access

Working in pairs students plan a climb of Mt Fuji.

They will need to research when is the best time to do the climb.

Get them to draw a detailed map of the mountain and plan a detailed itinerary for the climb.

(There is a wealth of information available on the net for this topic.)

Scan the story (approx. 8 minutes). Students go through the story, picture by picture, without reading the text, and answer the questions on Worksheet 12.

Play the story on the CD. The first time through, students listen and follow the pictures. Then play the story through again. This time the students follow the script and repeat after CD, sentence by sentence. (30 minutes if you include the vocab. List).

Divide the vocabulary list evenly among the students and have each student make an illustrated, colour, A4 flashcard for each of his/her assigned vocab. items.

Each student writes a sentence in Japanese, using his/her word or phrase, to go on the back of the flashcard.

LESSON 2

Review language and structures (1 hour)

You will need:

Vocabulary flashcards made in Lesson 1

Using the flashcards made in Lesson 1, review the language and structures featured in the story. (15 minutes)

Discussion and explanation of how to read the Katakana words. (Not how to read Katakana, but how to pronounce the words using the furigana, and then how to recognise the English word represented in the Katakana.)

Students work in pairs to produce two posters. One depicting the four gaits of the horse—walk, trot, canter and gallop, labelled in Japanese. The second gives the instructions for the horse-riding lesson, in Japanese, with illustrations showing the students’ responses.

I hope to get the lesson sequence for Book 4 up by the end of tomorrow.

On Friday I will be driving down to Canberra for the AFMLTA Conference. It would be great to see some of you if you are there! I will be giving a workshop on Monday, on using the readers in the Japanese classroom. Really looking forward to it—though the build up is quite hectic!

But first, a reminder: the vocabulary lists for all four books in Series 1 are on Language Perfect, so, if your students are subscribed to Language Perfect, you can use them as a vocabulary-learning exercise.

The CD with the song and all four stories is getting closer—will keep you posted.

Suggested lesson sequence for ‘Jouba Kurabu de’—outline

1. Scan the story, picture by picture, without reference to the text. Listen to the story (CD); read the story.

2. Language structures and vocabulary of the story—1. Discussion and explanation of Katakana words. Overview of language structures.

Scan the story (approx. 8 minutes). Students go through the story, picture by picture, without reading the text, and answer the questions on Worksheet 7.

Play the story on the CD. The first time through, students listen and follow the pictures. Then play the story through again. This time the students follow the script and repeat after CD, sentence by sentence. (27 minutes if you include the vocab. List).

Divide the vocabulary list evenly among the students and have each student make an illustrated, colour, A4 flashcard for each of his/her assigned vocab. items.

Each student writes a sentence in Japanese, using those words or phrases, to go on the back of the flashcard.

Students complete Reading Comprehension (P 30), Question 1.

LESSON 2

Review language and structures (1 hour)

You will need:

Vocabulary flashcards made in Lesson 1

Using the flashcards made in Lesson 1, review the language and structures featured in the story. (15 minutes)

Discussion and explanation of how to read the Katakana words. (Not how to read Katakana, but how to pronounce the words using the furigana, and then how to recognise the English word represented in the Katakana.)

Complete Reading Comprehension Questions 2, 3 and 4.

LESSON 3

Dramatic interpretation of the characters in this story: 1

The preparation (1 hour)

Divide the class into 7 groups. Each group will study one of the characters as s/he is depicted in this story. They are to identify as many character traits as possible and then decide, as a group, how they can best portray their character in a brief sketch. They should choose one of the scenes in which their character appears and act out that scene, giving as much information as possible about their character’s personality. They could use or adapt the Japanese dialogue from the book, using their actions to convey the finer points of meaning. The students do not yet have the language to talk about feelings or emotions in Japanese and yet we want them to begin to walk in their character’s shoes. They should be prepared to answer questions in English about their feelings and/or emotional state at various points in their presentation, so you, as the teacher, should have some questions prepared (in English) to elicit this information from the students. Groups could be assigned characters, and the relevant pages to study as follows:

Group1: Riki. Pages 5, 8, 11, 18, 23, 24.

Group 2: Kenta. Pages 6, 15, 18.

Group 3: Emi. Pages 6. 9. 13, 14, 15, 20, 22.

Group 4: Liam. Pages 7, 11, 12, 17, 23, 24, 27, 29.

Group 5: Anna. Pages 10, 13, 14, 20, 22.

Group 6: Kazuki. Pages 12, 17, 19, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27.

Group 7: Ai. Page 26.

LESSON 4

Dramatic interpretation of the characters in this story: 2

The performances (1 hour)

Students perform their drama sketches and answer questions about their character’s feelings.

Students each write a character study of their assigned character, including as much detail as possible.

The aim of this research is to encourage students to cross between cultures—the horse culture in Australia and that in Japan. The history of the different horse breeds in Japan and Australia—how they developed and how they have been used within each culture—should help students gain some understanding of the different attitudes toward and popularity of the sport of horse riding in each country.

The information required to complete this worksheet is available on the internet.

I also recommend a book by Pamela Rushby: ‘The Horses Didn’t Come Home’

Angus & Robertson An imprint of Harper Collins Publishers. This is a very readable story of a young soldier and his horse in the Battle of Beersheba. It gives a human view of the role played by the Walers in our history.

That’s it for today. I will post lesson plans for the rest of Book 3 next time.

Students work in pairs to complete Task 4 of Worksheet 5—detailed plan or model of a typical ninja house.

LESSON 7
Dramatic interpretation of the story: 1 (1 hour)

Students work in groups of 6. Give each group one of the lessons to interpret dramatically.

Based on the information given in the story, each group prepares a short sketch depicting interactions and behaviour the 6 friends in that particular lesson. They should prepare statements of one or two sentences (in Japanese) for each group member to say about his/her role in that lesson. Alternatively, if the students are not so confident in Japanese, they could prepare a tableau vivant, depicting the atmosphere and message conveyed through the scene and be prepared to answer questions in English about how the character they represent is feeling at that time. Students could also prepare props to make their message more clear.

LESSON 8
Dramatic interpretation of the story: 2 (1 hour)

Students present their sketches, or tableaux vivants and answer questions from the teacher or other students as to what their character is thinking, feeling etc.

Have the students write a brief reflection of their experience.

LESSON 9
Cultural research
Japanese おべんとう
You will need:Worksheet 6
Internet access

Students complete Worksheet 6. Students bring their おべんとう to class for Lesson 10.

LESSON 10
Class lunch: おべんとう

You could commence this lesson with a ‘show and tell’ session, allowing the students to display their おべんとう before eating it. Students then present their Kami Shibai, their Ninjutsu demonstration and their model Ninja houses to the class.

That’s it for Book 2. Book 3 coming up next! I would love to hear from you if you have any comments.

Sorry for the gap between posts—my life has been somewhat disrupted as I have been travelling interstate attending some Japanese teachers’ conferences. Anyway, here I am back on track with some ideas for using Book 2 as a whole class activity and incorporating it into your Japanese teaching program.

If your students are subscribed to Language Perfect you will now find the word lists for the four books in Series 1 on the Language Perfect website. This means that you can add vocabulary learning and testing, and competitions to the list of activities related to each story.

I will also be releasing a CD in the near future. Readings of the four stories will be recorded onto it, along with the Rokunin no Tomodachi: Series 1 Song.

Suggested lesson sequence—outline

Scan the story, picture by picture, without reference to the text. Listen to the story (CD); read the story

Review language structures and vocabulary of the story

Cultural research—raccoon dogs and Japanese monkeys

Creative activity: Kamishibai

Ninjutsu—what exactly is it? Research

Creative activity: students make a model of a typical ninja house

Dramatic interpretation of the story

Dramatic interpretation of the story (contd.)

Research Japanese Obentou

Class lunch おべんとう. In groups, students present results of research in form of Kami Shibai, Ninjutsu demonstration, model Ninja house

LESSON 1

Scan, listen to, read the story (1 hour). Students work in pairs or small groups.

Scan the story (approx. 8 minutes). Students go through the story, picture by picture, without reading the text, and answer the questions on Worksheet 3.

Play the story on the CD. The first time through, students listen and follow the pictures. Then play the story through again. This time the students follow the script and repeat after CD, sentence by sentence. (24 minutes if you include the vocab. List).

Divide the vocabulary list evenly among the students and have each student make an illustrated, colour, A4 flashcard for each of his/her assigned vocab. items.

Each student writes a sentence in Japanese, using those words or phrases, to go on the back of the flashcard.

LESSON 2

Review language and structures (1 hour)

You will need:

Vocabulary flashcards made in Lesson 1

Using the flashcards made in Lesson 1, review the language and structures featured in the story. (15 minutes)

As part of my research into Ninjutsu, I contacted a local Ninjutsu Sensei, who was very helpful. I observed some training sessions and he was more than happy to answer questions. If there is a group near you, you may be able to arrange a visit to your school—either from the teacher or some of the advanced students.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

As well as the Websites cited above or in the worksheets, I found the following resources useful in gaining an understanding of the art of Ninjutsu.

Today’s post is about the remainder of the lesson sequence for Book 1.

In lesson 5 we will be setting the scene for the taste testing of Japanese snack foods and lesson 6 will be the actual taste-testing activity. I have used these two lessons as a means of getting students to reflect on their own cultural and linguistic identity and then to experience an aspect of another culture.

LESSON 5—preparation for the taste-testing activity

In this lesson each student will reflect on his/her cultural background by considering what part of the world their family has come from and what language(s) their forbears originally spoke. Each student will then consider the current culture of his/her family in terms of food—snack foods, typical family meals and customs observed in relation to eating. The information from individual students will then be collated to show the variety of cultural and linguistic identities represented in the class.

Get the students to copy the heading ‘My Cultural Background’ into their books. Under sub-headings ‘Grandparents’, ‘Parents’ and ‘Me’, get them to write where the person was born and what languages the person spoke/speaks. Places that students’ families have come from could be marked with pins on a map of the world, or with texta on a blank world map. Cultural and linguistic backgrounds could be collated on the SmartBoard or butchers’ paper. Students could then list these in their notebooks under the heading ‘Cultural Backgrounds of other Students in the class’.

Each student writes what s/he eats for recess at school and for afternoon tea at home.

Class discussion about snack foods. These foods could also be collated on the butchers’ paper or SmartBoard.

Each student describes a typical family meal in his/her family. These meals should be added to the growing list of information about the class.

Class discussion about the snacks and meals. Ask the students about any meal-related customs in their family. Questions such as: ‘Does the whole family eat all meals together?’ then continue to draw out further information along those lines. ‘How is the food served?’ (Everyone helps themselves from large bowls of food or each individual is served by the person who cooked the meal, etc).

Students write about 100 words under the heading ‘Food- and meal-related customs in my family’.

Choose about 6–8 different types of せんべい. When I do this activity, I have the students sitting in groups of 4, and use small paper plates for the tasting samples. Number the plates from 1 to 6 (or 8, depending on the number of items to be tasted) and put a sufficient quantity of each type of rice cracker for 4 students to taste, on to the appropriately numbered plate. If you have easy access to other types of Japanese snack foods such as こんぶ or うめぼし, you could include them as well.

The students fill out Worksheet 2 as they taste the せんべい.

Conclude the lesson with a class discussion of the experience.

LESSON 7: Cultural research

Japanese family life 2: typical Japanese family meal

Students research a typical Japanese family meal, either breakfast or the evening meal, and present their results as a poster or PowerPoint presentation. Their research should cover the following points:

What dishes are served for the meal (menu for the meal)

Japanese names for the dishes if possible

What sort of plates, bowls etc. are used

Etiquette for eating the meal, including greetings before and after the meal

Recipes for the dishes that make up the meal

LESSON 8: Class activity—a Japanese meal

I always find eating works well with students of any age. Depending on the situation at your school, its geographic location and the size of your Japanese class, the way you organise the Japanese meal will vary. At one school where I taught we had a large number of native speaker students. By that I mean about 50 students across Years 7–12. The Japanese mothers were very keen to help in any way, so I asked if they would be prepared to cook with the students one Japanese dish per class in Years 7–10. They were excited to be able to do this and organised a roster. We prepared dishes such as Oknomiyaki, Yakisoba, Onigiri, Makizushi. The mothers brought all the ingredients and anything necessary for cooking the dish. I collected money from the students to cover the cost. The mothers gave me the recipe, which I gave to the students at the cooking lesson. The Japanese mothers demonstrated each step so the students did not need to translate. Of course, this activity worked at different levels for the different students, but I found that every student gained considerably from the experience.

At other schools, where there were no native speakers, I have organised a Japanese breakfast with a class that was on Period 1or 2. The breakfast was very simple, but included ごはん、 みそしる、つけもの、and some おかず.

You might be able to organise a class lunch at a local Japanese restaurant.

Or you could get the students to plan their own typical Japanese meal and spend another lesson working out the logistics of the meal.

As long as the students get to eat some Japanese food, it is good!

That’s it for today. I hope you and your students enjoy ‘Nihon wa hajimete desu’.

Today I will present some ideas for using Book 1 as a whole class activity.

I would probably introduce Book 1 early in Term 2—after the students have learned to read and write all the Hiragana. They will not all be fluent readers or writers as yet, and their vocabularies will be limited, so I would use Book 1 firstly, to encourage students to sound out the hiragana in the variety of combinations that form the words making up the story, thus improving their confidence and fluency in reading. Secondly, I would use Book 1 to develop the students’ skills to infer meaning from text by considering all the clues available—in this case, the context, illustrations and diary entries. Students should be encouraged to examine the illustrations carefully, taking into account the whole scene, setting, body language, relationships between characters etc.

First I will outline a suggested lesson sequence for teaching using Book 1 ‘Nihon wa hajimete desu’. Then I will give a more detailed lesson plan for each lesson.

Suggested lesson sequence—outline

1. Read the story

2. Cultural research. Japanese family life: slippers and the Japanese bath

3. Dramatic interpretation of the story

4. Dramatic interpretation of the story (contd)

5. Preparation for taste-testing of Japanese snacks

6. Taste-testing activity—Japanese snacks

7. Research—typical Japanese family meal

8. Class activity—a Japanese meal

LESSON 1

Reading the story (1 hour)

Students work in pairs. Get the students to go through the book from page 5 to page 29, looking at the illustrations, but not trying to read the Hiragana at this stage. They should discuss the pictures and read the diary entries to get an outline of the story. I would get 2 or 3 pairs to share their ideas with the class. (Allow 10 minutes max. for this activity.)

Explain about the Katakana words and the Romaji guide to pronunciation. Go through all the Katakana words with the class and teach them how to pronounce them and how to work out the English meaning from that pronunciation. I would probably also look at the type of language on pages 18–21 (introductions and present-giving and –receiving) and page 24 (asking Liam about his age and leisure activities). You may like to get the students to guess what Kenta is doing on page 18 (practising Ninjutsu) and Kazuki on page 10 (practising skiing). (About 10 minutes).

Students work in pairs. Give each pair a section of the story and get them to sound out the Japanese and work out the meaning of their section. Give each pair a sheet of A4 paper for their English version. I would probably divide the story up as follows:

Pages 5–7 (13 lines) Page 8 (15 lines)

Page 9 (13 lines) Pages 10 & 11 (7 lines)

Page 14 (5 lines) Pages 16 & 17 (6 lines)

Page 18 (11 lines) Page 19 (9 lines)

Page 20 (10 lines) Page 21 (10 lines)

Pages 22 & 23 (11 lines) Page 24 (8 lines)

Pages 25–28 (10 lines)

I would give the longer sections to the more able students and the shorter sections to those who need more time. Each pair should work out the meaning of the language in their scene(s), drawing on prior knowledge and, if necessary, ‘guessing’ the meaning of the text, using clues provided in the illustrations, diary entries and back cover blurb. They then write out an English version of the story, in their own words, without consulting the Word List.

(Allow 15 minutes max. for this activity)

4. Each pair reports to the class. They read out their section in Japanese and then they read out their English version. The teacher only needs to query any glaring errors. Collect the sheets with the English versions and put on the class noticeboard.

I estimate that this step could take up to 25 minutes or even more with some classes. I think it is important to modify the times you allow for each step so that you complete to the end of Step 4 by the end of Lesson 1.

1. Divide the class into 7 groups. Each group will work on one scene from the story.

Group 1, 3 members. This group will work on a scene based on page 5 of the story. The characters are Liam and the official, who presents the scholarship plus Liam’s mother, who is in the audience. They act out the scene as it is shown and further suggested on page 5.

Group 2, 2 members. This pair acts out a scene based on page 7 of the story. The characters involved are Liam and Riki.

Group 3, 5 members. This group acts out a scene based on pages 10 & 11 of the story. The characters are Riki, his parents, Ai and Liam.

Group 4, 2 members The characters are Liam and Riki. They act out a scene based on pages 12, 13 & 14 of the story.

Group 5, 6 members. The characters are Liam, Riki, Kenta, Kazuki, Emi and Anna. They act out a scene based on pages 18–21 of the story.

Group 6, 5 members. The characters are Liam, Riki, Yamamoto Sensei, Sa-chan and Ta-chan. They act out a scene based on pages 22 & 23 of the story.

Group 7, 7 members. The characters are Liam, Riki, Kenta, Kazuki, Emi, Anna and Yamamoto Sensei. They act out a scene based on page 24 of the story.

2. In groups students discuss how they will act out their scene and who will play which role. As a group, they should analyse how each of the characters in the scene is feeling at that particular time—taking into consideration each character’s particular circumstances. For example: it is Liam’s second day in Japan—he doesn’t speak much Japanese and everything is strange. He may feel homesick and stressed by this, or he may be fascinated and excited to be in this new, exotic environment. The students then learn their parts, in Japanese, ready to perform in front of the class. They must also prepare a tableau vivant depicting their particular scene. They will form this tableau vivant when they have finished their role-play. They must also be prepared to answer questions about how their character is feeling, what thoughts are going through his or her head at various times during the role-play or after the formation of the tableau.

I would allow the students the full lesson for this preparation phase. You want each one to ‘step into the shoes’ of the character s/he is portraying; to put her/himself into that character’s situation, in order to gain some understanding of another point of view.

Students also need time to practise their lines in Japanese, to gain confidence with the language and so they feel more comfortable performing in front of the class.

LESSON 4

Dramatic interpretation of the story: 2 (1 hour)

1. Starting with Group1 and proceeding through the story in order, the students perform their role-plays, each group ending in their tableau vivant. The teacher asks questions of each character in the tableau, such as: ‘How are you feeling right now?’ ‘What did you think/feel when X said/did/asked you Y?’ (What you choose for X and Y will depend on the content of the scene).

2. Get students to write a brief reflection on their experience. This should be written in their Japanese exercise book, or some notebook that is for their eyes only.

That’s it for today. Next post I will continue explanations of the next few lessons.

Following are some suggestions for using the readers with the whole class. Some activities would be more suitable for serious, more able students, whereas others would be within reach of all students—even those who are struggling with the language.

1. Students work individually, or in pairs.
Get them to go through the book from Page 5 to Page 29, studying the pictures but not worrying about the text at this stage. There will also be one or two of Liam’s diary entries in English. Ask them to write out the story-line in English, giving as much detail as possible.

2. Students work in pairs.
Get them to read through the story aloud, one page at a time, sounding out the Hiragana. Each pair should discuss the meaning of the language in each scene, drawing on prior knowledge and ‘guessing’ the meaning depicted in the illustrations. Then they should write out an English version of the story, in their own words, without consulting the Word List.

This could be quite a time-consuming task. In order to maintain the students’ interest, you could divide the story into scenes and get each pair to work on one or two scenes. In most cases each page is a separate scene, although sometimes a scene may continue over a couple of pages or there could be two scenes to a page. In this case, the more able students could be given the larger blocks of text and those, who are experiencing difficulties could be given less challenging sections.

When the pairs have all completed their sections, you could hold a class discussion—each pair reporting back, reading their scene in Japanese and then presenting their version of the scene(s) in English. You could compile a class version of the whole story, in English, on a Smart Board, if you have one, or on the whiteboard. As each pair reports, they should justify any ‘guesses’ they have had to make, based on the illustrations, Liam’s diary or the back cover blurb.

3. Give students a section of the script with the lines jumbled and have students rearrange them in the correct order (without consulting the book).

4. Dramatic interpretation of the story.
Choose some scenes from the story that lend themselves to role-play. Divide the class into an appropriate number of groups and get them to perform their role-play for the class. This performance could be mimed, or the students could learn their part in the dialogue and act out the scene, speaking the dialogue in Japanese. At the end of each scene (ie, at the end of each group’s role-play) the group should form a tableau that depicts the main idea(s) of the scene.

The teacher, or other students (depending on the size of the class and level of maturity of the students) then ask one or two key players in the scene, how they are feeling right now. Ideally these questions would be asked and answered in Japanese, but for students in their first year of learning the language this would be too difficult. The object of this exercise is to have students live the story through the eyes of one of the characters and this can be achieved equally well if the discussion is conducted in English.

5. Get the students to research any features of Japanese culture that appear in the books and present their findings as a 3D model, poster or PowerPoint presentation.

6. Get the students to research some or all of the food featured in a particular story and present their findings as a poster or as a PowerPoint presentation.

7. Students collaborate in groups to bring in samples of Japanese food, or even a meal, to share with the class.

8. Get together typical Japanese snacks/pickles such as dried fish,
かまぼこ、 たくあん、 うめぼし、 つけもの、 おせんべい and set up a taste-testing activity for the students.

These are all general suggestions. In future posts, I will suggest lesson sequences with exercises, activities and worksheets specific to each story.

I first recognised the need for supplementary, illustrated Hiragana readers for beginner students of Japanese when I was teaching Japanese in a large state high school in NSW. In NSW, in order to qualify for the School Certificate, students must study one language for 100 hours within any one school year. In most schools this compulsory 100 hours is completed in Year 7 or Year 8. In the school where I was teaching, it happened in Year 8 and it was not unusual for me to teach three or four Year 8 classes. In the typical Year 8 Language class of 30 students, there would be 8–10 who were really keen, 5–6 who were disinterested or even actively disruptive with the remainder keen to learn but experiencing varying degrees of difficulty with the language. When I set a task for the class, the keen students would commence work immediately and have completed this task before most of the others were organised to begin. These keen students would then want more work, and what they needed, in order to become fluent in reading Hiragana, was more reading material. I wanted to give them something that was interesting—a story that they would enjoy, but there was nothing available that was appropriate. I set myself the task of writing such a story but it wasn’t until I retired from teaching that I found the time necessary to do justice to this work. In the past year I have written and published Rokunin no Tomodachi: Series 1, four illustrated readers written in Hiragana. The main character in the stories, Liam, a 15 year-old Aussie boy, is in Japan for six months on a scholarship. He wants to become a ninja. The stories follow Liam’s adventures as he encounters Japanese language and culture, makes new friends and enjoys summer holidays in Japan.

After publishing these readers I have realised that there are many ways they could be used in the Japanese classroom, and in this and subsequent posts I intend to share my ideas for doing this.

The first way, of course, would be to use them in the multi-level class, as I had originally intended. Ideally I would have 10–15 sets available and students would take a story to read after they had completed the compulsory work for that lesson. I recommend that the students first read the back cover blurb, which is in English. Then they should read through the story out loud, sounding out the Hiragana syllables and, using the pictures to help, try to work out the meaning. They should do this one page at a time, as, in most cases, each page is one scene from the story. They can also use Liam’s diary entries to assist their comprehension. They should then attempt the Reading Comprehension exercises on Pages 30 and 31. All this should be done without consulting the Word List on Page 32. When they have completed the comprehension exercises, students should check their answers, looking up in the word list any words of which they are still unsure. After that they should complete the ‘Extension’ or ‘Creative’ task, which, I’m afraid, the teacher would have to check.

Alternatively, you could set aside one lesson per week or fortnight, when the keener or more advanced students work only with the readers, according to the guidelines set out above.

The time that this would take would, of course, depend on the ability of the individual students, but I would allow at least two fifty-minute periods for a focused, enthusiastic student to read the story and complete the exercises.